Freedom and Creativity: The Magic of Fly Design by Kenny Abrames
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I think of flies as pieces of art. They start off as feelings, simple wonderings, then grow into ideas and emerge finally as questions seeking solutions. The solutions are interesting, but they are not the goal, only a part of the process of discovery. The feeling always comes first. It may be sparked by the flick of a baitfish next to a rock or the sight of a seagull, tern or heron turning in mid-flight and landing. The feeling may trigger a memory from my boyhood or a story I have heard. It comes somehow and I am glad when it does. It opens me to creativity and I welcome and savor this. Sometimes I hold the feeling back, not allowing it to focus just yet. I let it grow in a hidden way waiting for it to burst forth and bud and perhaps to bloom. I like this feeling of holding back and waiting for the right time. When it does come it carries many gifts. I know the fly, the fish, the presentation, the color, the colors, the water, the quality of light and I know what it is I am looking for, how to form it and fish it, and all of this comes in a flash without words. Then, as I follow the feeling, the words come. The materials are first reached for, and then named and shaped . As I look at the fly, perhaps I will see another dimension to it or several, and I play with the theme. It may grow to be a fly that resonates with the insight that formed it from my feeling or it may not. When I fish it, the fish themselves will answer the question. The worth of the fly is only that to me and I leave it behind and move on to the next question. This, to me, is the essence of fly design. If the idea of the fly holds and I can feel the adventure of discovering something, then I will try to refine it to it's most simple form. The essence of the fly or the idea of the fly is much more important to me as the root of an expression or question than a single taxonomic image could ever be. A fly should work even as a non-exact or non-taxidermic reproduction because it has to imply more than what a light reflective image can reproduce. It has to embody ordinariness, dimensionality, translucency, harmony, and be dynamically balanced and integrated with the natural energies of which it is a part. This has been my observational and practical experience when tying flies. It is true for me. And yet I know that this view is true in some form for all fly fishermen, even those who hold to the interpretations passed down within tradition and also for those who try to mimic nature through exact visual duplication. I know that they are attempting to portray the elusive look of life within the creature and they often do. To capture the look of life through exact imitation is a perfectly reasonable approach to take and when the definition of exact imitation is expanded to include the unknown and unexplored possibilities which definition can never fully contain, then the probable solutions become limitless. The imposed boundaries of fixed definition have no place in creative exploration. The boundary of a bent pin with a feather fastened to it had to be crossed before the Jock Scott could be imagined. I seek the essential core first. Then, because I have an understanding of what idea is basic to the fly, I can add form and detail to it rather than starting with the focus on detail and a blind faith that the fly will contain that essential spark of life I seek. Sometimes the essence of a fly may be only a touch of color, perhaps orange with a touch of blue flash. That's it. A detail that is also the core. What can you do with something as vague as that? A great deal. One dark and stormy night, while fishing a beach on Martha's Vineyard, I saw what felt to me like a touch of orange and a blue flash in the water and I became intrigued. I looked to where I had noticed it in the water and turned on my flashlight. There was a swarm of squid milling in the shallow water. Later, I tied some flies with the orange and blue color note. I shaped them and built them from the idea of - orange and blue flash at night equals squid to me - perhaps? The fly was the question and eventually with a little tweaking, it was answered by the fish with a yes. Is this fly the only question the fish say yes to? No! So I continue to find more questions. I choose to view it this way because it allows me the freedom to not have answers to depend on - only more and more questions. This attitude prevents me from becoming stale and rigid in my opinions or becoming fixed into a routine that excludes new ways of seeing familiar phenomena. It keeps me continuously fluid and always seeking what I have overlooked before. Flies are beautiful objects. Paintings are beautiful objects. There is an energy within the Mona Lisa that cannot be captured by a paint by number reproduction even if Leonardo himself did it according to the directions. The energies used to form them are of different orders. When I see photographs laid out in magazines or books of fly boxes neatly arranged with rows of patterns each exactly the same, I wonder why? They do look nice on a page, perhaps that's why. It is graphic design and it is sensitive to the pictorial and collectable beauty of fly patterns. There is much more to fishing with flies than the beauty of the patterns. The flies that are tied by fishermen are tied one at a time and they are all different. The pattern may be generic but the individual fly never is. Some flies are tied in such a way that they catch fish better than others. This is also a part of good fly design, creating each fly with an awareness of how the particular materials used interact with each other and how to form and balance them so they not only match a recipe but swim and move with the illusion of a living presence. Flies that are tied with this goal in mind are precious to the fishermen who have them. Allow yourself to tie flies from your feelings and show them to the fish. After all, that is how flies were made in the first place. Let the fish judge your flies. They are the connoisseurs of fly design and their verdict is the only one that counts. Fly tying tradition is in a sense precious and it is to be respected. Respect is a very large word. It can be a doorway to knowledge and freedom or it can be a binding to opinion and structure. Respect your own curiosity and explore from it. That is respecting and using the lore of the past. Knowing someone's work is important and this knowing influences what it touches. Still, there are many Madonna and Child paintings and all are unique. Feelings are the fuel with which we create, and no matter how they come, they belong to the one who feels them. Honoring tradition does create and add value to whatever a man does. To fashion a fly from tradition is an honorable practice. A tradition is a storehouse of knowledge that is available for exploration. Familiarity with a tradition can be empowering but when this expertise is imposed to define correctness it diminishes into opinion. There are many opinions and there will always be room for many more. Hopefully, there never will be a final word. It is important to remember the root of fly tying. It is not to seek glory or identity from our fellow men but simply to tie flies as an expression of our feelings and ideas and to use them to catch fish with. It is equally as important to honor the tradition of sharing with others what we have discovered and to humbly accept the fact that it is because of this spirit of sharing that we have come to know most of what we take for granted as fundamental in fly tying. Once upon a time, there was no Lefty's Deceiver nor was there an idea of one but there was a feeling and a fellow who found it and held it and reached for the materials and named them and shaped them. Then he shared with others what he had found. The rest of the story is called tradition. It has no final page. There is no deadline for submittals.

Also see Kenny's piece: Squid & Shrimp

Copyright 1998 Kenny Adams

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